by Jen Blood
“But you were thinking it.”
The smirk transformed into a slow, easy grin. He eyed me up and down, his gaze lingering at the cigarette now between my lips. “That’s not what I was thinking.”
My heart sped up just a shade, though this time I couldn’t lay the blame on exertion.
“Do you want a ride?”
I had another mile or so to get back to Diggs’ place. My right calf was cramping, I was getting a blister on my left heel, and my sports bra didn’t fit nearly as well as it had in the store. I glanced at Einstein, who didn’t even have the decency to pant.
“Sure—I think Stein’s tired.”
Juarez just kept grinning.
◊◊◊◊◊
When Juarez found out I was going to Portland, he managed to finagle an invite without too much actual finagling. He waited while I showered and changed, I did the unforgiveable and dumped Einstein on Diggs for the afternoon, and we were on the road by eleven.
The first forty-five minutes of the drive was awkward, filled with stilted conversation and some of the most god-awful music I’d ever heard. Juarez was freshly shaven and appropriately casual in jeans and a black t-shirt that did obscene things for his arms. We took his car—a zippy little five-speed Honda Civic that didn’t mesh with my image of an FBI man in the least. In fact, nothing about Jack Juarez meshed with my image of an FBI man. Didn’t FBI men drive SUVs and believe in wire tapping, necessary force, and the innate beauty of the good old U.S. of A.?
Juarez talked about swimming with porpoises in Miami, appeared to know all the words to every Taylor Swift song ever penned, and drove five miles under the speed limit for the duration of the drive. Every so often, he would look at me with those dark, dark eyes, and a shiver would run from my kneecaps to my navel. Physically, everything about him whispered an implication of the erotic—he looked like the kind of man who could recite Yeats to you in one breath and tie you to the bedpost in the next. But, he drove like my grandfather and had the musical tastes of a prepubescent girl.
I couldn’t get a read on him for the life of me.
We followed Route 17 into Augusta again because Juarez wanted to drop off a couple of things for Matt. Traffic was light and the sun was shining. Once we got to the veteran’s hospital, I waited in the car while Jack went in.
Togus is the oldest VA hospital in the country, set up in 1866 by Abe Lincoln himself during the Civil War. The hospital itself is immense and old and brick, the grounds well-kept and quiet. I fiddled with the radio and tried not to feel guilty for dumping Einstein on Diggs for an afternoon in the city with another man, and ultimately ended up getting pissed off that I had to feel guilty in the first place when Diggs had made it perfectly clear that any romantic interest he might have had in me once upon a time was long dead.
By the time Juarez returned, I was still feeling guilty but now I was feeling pissed off and guilty. Awesome. I pushed all of that aside, however, when I caught a glimpse of Juarez’s face; clearly, the visit hadn’t gone well. He got into the car and started the engine without looking at me. We were on 295 headed to Portland before he said a word.
“Sorry it took so long.”
“Is he okay?”
“He’s not doing as well as I’d hoped. The other night when he saw you, what did he say? He’s been strange ever since—I’m trying to figure out if it might have triggered something.”
I thought about it. “He said he dreamed I was coming. Or dreamed me. I got the sense it wasn’t a good dream, in either case.” He waited for me to continue, while I debated the wisdom of giving him the whole truth. Based on his demeanor, it seemed like the kindest option. “He said, ‘Your dog will die like a dog… I watched the fires burn and I’ll watch you die with a bullet in your skull. Just like him.’”
Working as a reporter from the time you’re fifteen has its benefits; I can quote entire conversations verbatim should the need arise. It used to drive Michael nuts.
Juarez drove in silence for a while, staring straight ahead. Finally, he met my eye for an instant before he returned his attention to traffic.
“I really am sorry. I don’t know what that meant… What he was thinking.”
“He never liked me much. Apparently, the years haven’t done anything to change his opinion.”
I waited for him to argue the point. He did not.
“I’m assuming he was in Vietnam?” I asked.
“Three tours. Shrapnel in his knees and terrible stories he’d tell me when I was a kid. He and Joe signed up together.”
That stopped me. “The old fire chief? I didn’t know they even knew each other back then—it always seemed like your uncle and Joe Ashmont didn’t get along.”
Juarez shrugged. He passed a couple of pickups and slid back into the right lane without using his blinker, which was tantamount to vehicular madness compared to the way he’d been driving before. The Fed was loosening up.
“They had a fight at some point—over a woman, I think. But they grew up together in an orphanage in Westbrook. Neither of them had the best childhoods.”
I saw an opening and took full advantage. “Did Matt ever talk to you about the fire when you were a kid? He and Joe were the first ones out there—them and my mother, anyway. I was hoping I’d get a chance to talk to Matt directly about the whole thing, but I don’t know if that’s the best idea given the circumstances.”
He shot me a wry smile. “I think that’s a safe bet. He never said very much about that day, though. Matt never liked to talk about work.”
He was lying. I could tell by the way his hands tightened on the steering wheel as he risked a glance my way. His jaw tensed. Juarez had half a dozen tells, but the fact that he was a bad liar did nothing to ease my mind.
“That’s weird—most cops I know love to relive their glory days.”
“Thirty-four people died. He knew a lot of them. I don’t think he thought of that as a glory day.”
Right. Things got quiet again. I almost reached for the radio, but the thought that I might have to live through another Christina Aguilera/Kelly Clarkson medley stopped me cold.
“Do you remember the island?” he asked me after a few minutes. “You lived out there as a child, didn’t you? You must remember what it was like out there.”
“I remember a lot of it.”
“The people?”
“It was a small community—we knew each other pretty well.” Before he could continue with his questions, I countered with one of my own.
“What about you? You grew up in Miami—you must have some stories.”
“A lot different than life in Maine, that’s for sure. I went to a parochial high school. Joined the Marines not long after.”
“And before that? You didn’t start spending summers in Maine until you were a teenager, right? Where did little Jack Juarez spend his formative years?”
I’d been a reporter long enough to recognize the silence that followed: he was trying to decide how much of his story he was willing to tell. I kept my mouth shut and let him figure it out for himself.
“I don’t remember,” he finally said.
“You don’t remember meaning, ‘I don’t want to talk about it’?”
“ ‘I don’t remember’ as in, I don’t remember. I have no memories before I was a teenager.”
That certainly stopped me. I stared at him. “No memories at all? Until when?”
“Thirteen,” he said without hesitation. “I remember everything after that.”
“But nothing before,” I said. “Bike accidents, family pets, childhood illnesses?”
“No. What about you?”
“I remember all of them—I’m not the issue here. Don’t you have family photos? What about stories your parents tell you?”
“My parents are dead. I don’t remember them. I was raised by nuns in a convent just outside the city.”
Logic was starting to stymie me. “Wait… Matt Perkins was an orphan.”
He loo
ked like he didn’t get the connection.
“How did he find out he was your uncle? And why didn’t he… I don’t know, adopt you, instead of just having you up for the summers?”
Once the light bulb clicked, Juarez shook his head. “He’s not really my uncle. He was in Miami one winter and ended up doing some maintenance work at the convent. We hit it off.”
“And these nuns had no problem sending you a thousand miles away every summer to live with a strange bachelor who liked to give you presents and call you his nephew?”
That earned a smile. “They were very trusting women.”
“Apparently.”
We were in Portland by this time. Jack took the Forest Ave exit without directions from me and we merged with traffic heading past the University of Southern Maine, nestled in a neighborhood in the city’s East End.
“Have you tried hypnosis?” I asked.
“Gee, I hadn’t thought of that.”
I gave him a look, which he returned.
“You said it’s on Baxter?”
It took a second before I realized that he was talking about Jim Abbott’s place. “Yeah—he’s got a duplex.” I gave him the address.
My experience with Portland in recent years was limited to the downtown area, but Juarez navigated the quiet, tree-lined streets as though he’d spent some time there. Yet another topic to pursue when conversation lagged. For now, though, I had to get to work. He pulled into a rutted driveway badly in need of fresh paving, beside a faded gray duplex badly in need of fresh paint.
“I could come with you if you’d like,” he offered.
“I think I’ve got it. Thanks, though. I probably won’t be more than an hour, tops—I’ll give you a call when I’m done?”
“Sounds good. I’ll see you soon.”
His hand brushed mine and our eyes caught. I forgot about his slow driving and terrible taste in music.
“Will you have dinner with me tonight?” he asked. “My treat. There’s a nice little Eritrean place on the other side of town.”
So, Juarez was familiar enough with Portland to know out-of-the-way ethnic places on the wrong side of the tracks. So many mysteries, so little time.
I nodded. “You’re on. I’ll talk to you soon.”
The way things were going, we could spend another half an hour in the car discussing our plans for the evening, so I climbed out before I completely lost track of why I was there. He waited with the engine idling until I got to Jim Abbott’s door, then drove off five miles under the speed limit once Abbott opened up and ushered me inside.
Chapter Eleven
Jim Abbott was built like a very tall stick figure, with the posture of a yogi and a tangle of graying curls atop his narrow head. Two greyhounds, one flanking him on either side, completed what was a distinctly Seussian picture. Neither of the dogs barked, but they both sniffed at me politely before trotting off on slender legs to curl up side by side on a floral sofa pushed up against the far wall.
The apartment had old-fashioned wallpaper decorated with tiny pink roses, and a hardwood floor that needed buffing. Newspapers and boxes were piled high in every corner. A modular television the size of a bureau was tuned to a news program with the sound off.
Abbott motioned me through an archway to the kitchen, where the wallpaper had daisies and the appliances hadn’t been updated since the ‘50s. We sat at a faded red kitchen table with matching vinyl chairs.
“It was my mother’s place,” Abbott explained. “She died six months ago—I’m still trying to clear everything out.”
“I’m sorry. Don’t worry about it, though—it’s very Donna Reed.”
He laughed. The sound triggered something—a flash of the past that was there and gone so quickly that it was hard to hang onto. Another kitchen table, long thin fingers clasped together. The same laugh, as my mother scolded me for… what?
“We’ve met before,” I said. It was a revelation to me, and sounded it.
He nodded. His eyes were blue-gray and clear, giving the impression that he was younger than I suspected he must be.
“I wasn’t sure you’d remember. It was a tough time, I know.”
I tried to call up other memories, unsuccessfully. I felt like a swimmer navigating murky waters, the pictures around me too hazy to see clearly. Over the stove in Jim Abbott’s kitchen, there was a black and white, plastic clock shaped like a cat’s head. With each passing second, the bulging eyes moved from side to side. The time was quarter past two.
I handed him the photos I’d found in Malcolm Payson’s things, uncertain how else to begin.
Abbott took them and shuffled through. “Son of a bitch,” he said softly, when he got to the shot of the padlocked door. He looked annoyed, but not particularly surprised. “Where did you get these?”
“Isaac Payson’s brother died—he left me the island, actually. These photos were in with a box of his things.”
He shook his head and continued looking.
“I found the notes you took after you questioned my mother and me.”
His eyes remained on the photos in his hands. I could tell by the slight tensing of his thin shoulders that I had his attention.
“You thought I was lying to you.”
Abbott considered the statement long enough for the cat clock to roll its eyes a couple dozen times. He carefully put the photos back in order and set them on the table.
“Have you shown these to your mother?”
“Kat?” It wasn’t the question I’d expected. “No—I’ve only told a couple of people about them. My mother and I don’t really…”
He nodded without waiting for me to finish the sentence. “I’d be interested to hear what she has to say about them.”
“Why?”
He knotted and unknotted his long fingers. Cracked the thumb knuckle of his left hand. The murky waters settled, for just a second.
“She’s a child—she doesn’t have to tell you a damned thing. She didn’t see anything. She told Constable Perkins what she knows.”
My mother is angry. I sit at the kitchen table in a chair too big for my child-sized legs to reach the floor, Jim Abbott seated across from me.
“You don’t have to be afraid, Erin. I’m not here to hurt your Dad.”
“Get out.” My mother pulls the policeman from his chair, and I worry that he will shoot her. Arrest her. She’s all I have left.
“I don’t want to talk anymore.” I start to cry.
The tall policeman goes away.
I couldn’t remember him coming back.
“You think my mother had something to do with a cover-up?” I asked.
“I do,” he said without hesitation. “She was one of the first ones out there. I think she was protecting your father.”
“My father was with me.”
He smiled, just a little. Kept his eyes steady on mine. “So you said.”
I broke the stare first. I traced a crack in the Formica tabletop with my index finger. “My father died, you know.”
“I heard that. I’m sorry.”
“If something else happened that morning—something other than the story I gave police then…”
“You were ten years old, Erin. You’re not culpable for anything. That case was closed a long time ago.”
“What if I told you there was someone else on the island that morning? With that and these pictures, do you think they’d reopen the investigation?”
“What do you mean, there was someone else on the island?” he asked sharply. “When?”
“The day of the fire—my father and I went out there. There was a man in a black cloak… He chased me through the woods.” I stopped. For the first time, I thought I understood why Kat had been so hell- bent on me keeping quiet; the whole story really did sound insane.
Abbott clearly thought so, too, though he was kind enough to play along. “You think that’s the person who started the fire?”
I met his eye. “You were right—my father wa
sn’t with me that morning. Something happened, but I don’t know what. I don’t know where he went. You talked to my mother, you talked to me. Did you…” I hesitated. “Did you interview my father?”
“I did.” His voice was soft. “We spoke a few times. But he wasn’t exactly… The fire took a toll on him.”
“Meaning he went nuts,” I interpreted. I tried to keep my voice matter of fact, but there was a ragged edge that I couldn’t seem to control. “I know. He was never the same after that.”
“He asked you to lie for him that day?”
I hesitated before I finally gave in. “That morning. We were staying in a motel on the mainland. He left while it was still dark out, and didn’t get back until almost eleven. Before he left, he said I couldn’t tell anyone he’d left me in the room alone or he’d get in trouble.”
I thought of the giant motel beds, of scrounging for loose change in his pants pocket that morning so I could raid the hallway vending machine for breakfast. There was nothing usual about that morning.
“What was he like when he came back?” Abbott asked.
“That morning?” I thought about the question, phrasing my response carefully. “Distracted.”
“That’s it? Not upset?”
“We’ve gotta go, Erin—you don’t have time to get your clothes. We’ll get them later.” My father is crying when he comes through the door. He grabs me by the arm and drags me outside. He won’t answer my questions, and he drives too fast through Rockland traffic to get back to Littlehope.
“We’re gonna get arrested, Dad—slow down.”
He doesn’t answer. He is too white, and his clothes are drenched. Rain is coming down hard. During the car ride, he prays softly and keeps his fingers tight around the steering wheel.
“Yeah. He might have been a little upset.”
“What did he say? Did he tell you where he’d been?”
I shook my head—that much was true. “He didn’t say anything. Just that we had to get to the island, but I had to stay in the boat.”
“And when did you tell Katherine about this?”